There is a growing list of disagreements between France and the
United States. These range from sponsorship of the Arab-Israeli
talks, to the sanctions that Washington would like to see imposed on
countries that trade with Cuba, Iran or Libya, which is not to ignore
their important differences over the Afghan Taliban. Moreover, there
is ongoing discord regarding the candidacy of Boutros Boutros-Ghali
for a second term as UN Secretary-General: if Washington threatens to
use its veto, Paris makes clear that it will resort to similar steps
to oppose candidates who are not French-speaking.

By Eric Rouleau

In an unprecedented turn of events, the Secretary-General of the
United Nations is accused by the United States of being an obstacle
to reform, as well as being useless, conceited and a megalomaniac
into the bargain, if not corrupt. The Clinton administration is not
slow to rid itself of undesirables. Mr Boutros-Ghali is enjoined not
to seek a second mandate, or he will be vetoed by Washington.

The sole remaining superpower has declared war on a man who enjoys
the sympathy of the vast majority of the member countries of the UN.
No matter, comes the chilling reply from US representative Madeleine
Albright. Her governments decision is unchangeable: Mr
Boutros-Ghali must go, whatever the opinion of the international
community. The worst of all this is that the accusations against him
are generally little more than unsubstantiated smears, originated
anonymously and then taken up by the press. One of them, circulated
in late July, was actually false. For instance, in an off-the-cuff
comment to a group of journalists, Robert Rubin, one of Mrs
Albrights associates, let slip that the US government intended
to keep a very close watch on the use made by Mr Boutros-Ghali of UN
personnel to promote his re-election; and pointed out, by way of
example, that a top-ranking official had made a trip to Africa at the
American taxpayers expense. The head of the UN was thus placed
under suspicion of misuse of public funds. This prompted a furious
outburst from UN representative Sylvana Foa, herself a US citizen,
accusing her government of practices reminiscent of the McCarthy era
(the period during the 1950s when Senator Joe McCarthy led the US in
persecuting communists, both real and imagined).

The heat of the debate suggests that Mr Boutros-Ghali is a
dangerous subversive; but the truth is quite the opposite. Coming
from a distinguished and wealthy family, he is seen in his own
country as an enlightened conservative.

He was professor of international law when Nassers
successor, Anwar Sadat, promoted him to the top echelons of Egyptian
diplomacy. This was his reward for accompanying him to Jerusalem in
November 1977 for peace talks with Israel. Mr Boutros-Ghali was one
of the architects of the Camp David accords, for which he incurred
the wrath of Arab nationalists, leftists and Islamists alike. He
worked first for Mr Sadat and then for the current president, Hosni
Mubarak, who made him deputy prime minister. In late 1991, he
therefore appeared to be the ideal candidate for the post of
secretary-general. At the time, the US press was happy to highlight
the merits of a man who was African, Arab, Christian (a member of the
Coptic church), married to a wife from one of Egypts leading
Jewish families, anti-communist and pro-Israel to boot.

However, contrary to expectations, his qualities were not
sufficient to win him the backing of Washington. At the time, it was
thought that US reservations arose from the candidates
francophile leanings, since he was being actively canvassed by
France.

It was only the lack of suitable alternatives that eventually
resigned the United States to voting for the man they saw as "the
French candidate".

Prior to the 1991 elections, President Bush was warned by a
psychological profile contained in a CIA report that Mr Boutros-Ghali
was "uncontrollable" and "unpredictable". He was quite the opposite
of the kind of person the US administration wanted to see heading a
United Nations that was now unencumbered by the traditional
countervailing presence of the non-aligned nations and, more
particularly, the Soviet bloc. The fall of the Berlin wall had
enabled the United States to conduct the Gulf war almost as it
pleased and this suggested a model for the future: the UN proposes,
on Washingtons initiative, and the US disposes (1). But Mr
Boutros-Ghali did not share that view of the end of the cold war. The
UN was now free from the constraints of East-West rivalries. He
thought it should therefore, in the interests of peace, accept its
full responsibilities and even extend and strengthen them. Suiting
action to word, he presented two core documents, agendas for peace
and for development, which called for a wide-ranging programme of
reform.

In America, these proposals met with scepticism, laughter and
gnashing of teeth. Stating her governments position with her
familiar abruptness, Mrs Albright said that the secretary-general was
only trying to increase his powers. His proposals, especially for a
system of "preventive diplomacy" to avert confrontations, set up
rapid deployment units which would allow the UN to nip potential
conflicts in the bud, and even levy taxes to finance its operations,
were considered completely out of place. Mr Boutros-Ghali would do
better to confine himseld to acting as the UNs chief
administrative officer, Mrs Albright venomously warned in a speech on
25 June 1995. In other words, all-powerful America only wanted to
deal with an ordinary bureaucrat, who would, by definition, have to
obey or resign.

According to this scheme of things, that would mean sacking an
official who had not given full satisfaction. In this particular
case, one might ask how Mr Boutros-Ghali has been an "obstacle to
reform"? Did he not respond quickly to Americas request to
"slim down" the world body? His success so far has been described as
remarkable: UN personnel has been cut 25%, from 12,000 to 9,000, and
will fall to 8,000 in two years time. Highly paid top posts are
down from 48 to 37, 40% fewer than in 1984. And the operating budget
for 1996-1997 is 117 million dollars less than the previous
years.

The American government regards these achievements as
insignificant. But Mr Boutros-Ghali has repeatedly pointed out that
the unprecedented financial crisis that the organisation is going
through is due not to current expenditure, but to the cost of
peace-keeping operations. Since 1992 this has increased fourfold,
from 600 million dollars to 2.6 billion. The "blue berets" have
intervened on 17 different occasions in the last four years - with
United States agreement. This has not stopped Washington withholding
its dues from the UN: these now amount to 1.5 billion dollars, more
than half of what the organisation is owed (2.9 billion dollars last
July). The secretary-general has therefore not hesitated to take the
United States to task, though often not by name. In a speech in
London last January, he denounced the "dishonesty" of those who made
the UN ineffective by depriving it of essential funds while refusing
to pay the funds due to it on the pretext that it was
ineffective.

Mr Boutros-Ghali complains publicly that the Americans are making
his work more difficult, that the members of the Security Council are
giving him impossible tasks and that they are trying to escape
responsibility for their own failures by laying them at the door of
UN officials.

"Too much support for the third world

Obviously, he takes account of the fact that most of the member
states to which he owes his election are developing countries, whose
sympathies and aspirations he shares. Mild as it is, his support for
the third world irritates the American establishment, notably the
conservative element. He says it is his duty to defend the "orphans"
(the poor countries) against the ethnocentrism of the dominant
powers. For example, a section of western opinion was shocked when he
described the Bosnian conflict as a "war of the rich", drawing
attention to Somalia where, he said, one third of the population was
likely to die of hunger. Later, he accused the United States of
standing idly by during the genocide in Rwanda and of only getting
involved when the massacres had already decimated the population.

Mr Boutros-Ghali clashed with the United States again when he
hesitated to give the green light to the American plan to use NATO
air power to bomb Serbian positions. Washingtons anger peaked
when, in April 1996, he insisted on publishing the findings of the UN
inquiry implicating Israel in the killing of some hundred civilians
who had taken refuge in a United Nations camp in Kanaa in south
Lebanon.

Was this the straw that broke the camels back? The American
government suddenly announced on 19 June that it would use its veto
if the Egyptian diplomat were reelected.

In the middle of an election campaign, Bill Clinton no doubt
considered it unwise to allow the Republican Party the privilege of
being the only one to defend United States "sovereignty" against the
encroachments of the "supranational" state that the UN had supposedly
become in Mr Boutros-Ghalis hands. Playing on the nationalism
of his compatriots, Robert Dole repeatedly said in his speeches that
the deployment of American forces abroad would be decided in
Washington, not in New York, and by the President of the United
States, not by Boo-Boo (2).

Mr Dole himself is spurred on by the right wing of his party. For
example, Jesse Helms, chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs
Committee, recently proposed that the UN be given an ultimatum to
"reform itself radically" (in effect giving up virtually all its
humanitarian work) by the year 2000, failing which the United States
would withdraw from the organisation once and for all (3). In like
vein, Joe Scarborough, a Republican deputy, presented a bill to
Congress for Americas immediate withdrawal from the United
Nations and its accession to a yet to be founded League of
Democracies.

Is it a case of north against south? The United States against
Europe? That is what James Philips, a political analyst with the
Heritage Foundation, suggests. In a study published by this
ultra-conservative institution, he writes in substance that the UN
should be purged of the stigmata of "statism" and "socialism" that
have impregnated its structures, and that it should stop giving aid
to countries that need it and to "utopian objectives" such as the
eradication of poverty and the provision of medical care for all.

The debate therefore goes far beyond Mr Boutros-Ghalis
management or personality. Post-cold war America is tempted to take
control of the world organisation as an instrument of power. And it
is no accident that a large number of countries, and important ones
at that, have announced their support for Mr Boutros-Ghalis
candidature: several west European states, including France and
Germany, African countries (through the Organisation of African
Unity), China, Russia, Japan and Canada, for example, have in turn
announced that Mr Boutros-Ghali continues to enjoy their highest
esteem.

Are we heading for a confrontation inside the Security Council?
And, if the disagreement persists, will the United Nations General
Assembly be asked to arbitrate since, under its charter, it has the
right to impose the secretary-general of its choice? There is a
precedent for this: in 1950 Trygve Lie was elected to the post
despite the Soviet veto. In fact everything depends on the
determination of the "dissidents", especially the members of the
Security Council, not to bend to the American diktat. But also, no
doubt, on Washingtons desire to avoid a trial of strength that
might affect the prestige of the United States and the credibility of
the United Nations.